Here be Ghosts

SPECTATOR COMPETITION No. 353 Report by A. M. 0. S. own invention—

Competitors were invited to submit very short ghost stories of their the shorter, other things being equal, the better.

THIS may be a materialistic age, yet it is apparently one in which ghosts are very popular. 1 have been overwhelmed with no fewer than 250 ghost stories—weird, grim, gruesome, macabre, sad, moving, pointless, callous, comic, facetious, puzzling and (so the writers allege) true. Having dismissed mere leg-pulls and half a dozen chestnuts, and appreciated the only political ghost (During the Suez crisis, someone was seen to occupy the Seat of Government'—D. Roberts), I had somehow to eliminate 200- odd amusing and ingenious inventions in order to reduce the number of prize- winners to fairly reasonable proportions. I have never been in favour of subdividing the prize money, but this is a case which demands it. A system of drastic discards left me with sixteen entries. Becoming still more ruthless, I eliminated four of these—those of Canon J. H. Proctor, Joyce Johnson, G. J. Blundell and Nan Wishart. A prize of half a guinea each goes to the twelve com- petitors whose entries are printed below.

PRIZES 'In 'ere it was,' whispered the caretaker, fearfully. Then: 'What did you die of?'

(GLORIA PRINCE.)

'I remember the first time I came here,' said the woman standing beside me at the top of the Monument. 'I jumped. Exactly two hundred years ago today.' (HELEN MACGREGOR.) A man was walking on Salisbuly Plain at night when he was terrified by the sight of some men without faces. Their heads were all smooth in front, like eggs.

Seeing a horse and cart on the road, he ran after it and jumped on the back, screaming : 'Get me away from here. I've just seen some men without faces. Their heads are all smooth in front, like eggs.' You mean,' said the driver, turning round, 'like mine?' (HENRY MCKEAT1NG.)

She suddenly remembered the complaints about her absentmindedness and reluctantly got up from her cosy bed to make sure she had turned off the gas fire properly. At the fireplace she glanced across at her bed and was mildly indignant to notice that she was still,

apparently, asleep. (B. G. ANDREWS.)

An explosive snort out in the corridor; a pungent smell of mulligatawny soup. Damn the Colonel! I wish he could occasionally forget May 9th and the Indian Mutiny.

(A. A. MILLER.)

'Bathed in your own blood, grinning vacantly at the icy moon, your head severed from your body, snowflakes gently enshrouding your broken and twisted corpse—such is the death that awaits you, Jake Sigsby, for daring to challenge the Spirits of Night,' said the Spectre, its voice echoing among the tomb- stones.

The solitary listener clasped his hands. 'But I'm not Jake Sigsby,' he said. (c. D. TuTTLE.) Stripping layers of old wallpaper in the draw- ing-room one evening in late March disclosed a tall, narrow door in the chimney breast. Curious to prise it open, I was approaching my scraper to the crack, when a muffled voice, low and anxious, asked : 'Are the press-gang

gone yet?' (a. E. R. JOHNSON.) I met X yesterday. He looked pale and haggard. 'I have had a shattering experience,' he said. 'My twin brother died recently. He and I were as like as two peas : no one ever knew us apart. Last night he appeared at my bedside, and said : "I have a terrible secret to divulge. You and I were changed in our cradles. It is you who are dead, not I."

`And now, how shall I ever know if he spoke

the truth?' (it KENNARD DAVIS.) I was just going to lock up the café for the night when I saw a customer standing by the counter. I was surprised to see him, for I h,81 not heard the buzzer go. 'Can 1 help you? said. The fellow seemed nervous. 'Er—do Yo", serve spirits?' be asked. 'Afraid not, ; answered. 'Soft drinks only.' But he biw, disappeared. (BARBARA SMOKER') The bride disliked the house from moment she first saw it. She couldn't put her fears into words, but she knew that whenever she wiped her hands on the towel in the kitchen after washing up, she found she was drying someone else's hands as well as her own. (GRANVILLE °ARLEY', 'Can I give that boy a sweet?' asked tb° little girl. 'If he'd like one,' said her mother, and smiled indulgently until she saw the ball go past the dozing child on her neighbour.e lap, saw the Strawberry Chumble rise from it' watched it unwrap itself, hover an instant' and, as the cellophane wrapper dropped to lb° floor, saw it vanish in the tiny, empty space between the two soldiers strap-hanging in 01 crowded bus. (DENNIS RUDDER', Robert Grimes fell asleep in the haunted Blue Room Where each luckless guest had till now met 1115 doom : When he woke up next morning he reached for his Times

And read the obit. of the late Robert Grinteg

(AGNES KENNET14